


The Bate Program

by redd093



Category: No Fandom
Genre: Fiction, Gen, General fiction, Literature, Short Stories, prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 09:37:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1464553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redd093/pseuds/redd093
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Just an idea that I got. Plus, I love stories of the human spirit.</p>
    </blockquote>





	The Bate Program

**Author's Note:**

> Just an idea that I got. Plus, I love stories of the human spirit.

In the year 2057, a college student starts developing a computer program that will forever change the world. After a heated debate with his comic book nerd friends, he sets off to prove that his favorite fictional character would win in a fight with his friend's favorite fictional character. What he comes up with is a program that calculates overall fighting performance through the input of data such as strength, speed, stamina, fighting style, experience, and any notable abilities (in his case, his vote's power of flight and his friend's vote's power of heat vision). He punches in calculations such as greatest weight the subject has lifted, fastest speed the subject has moved, etcetera. It takes him a year to categorize base weights of all known objects, base speeds of all known animals, and things like that. It takes him another year to work out the science behind all known comic book super hero powers and weapons. After a total of three years, when his program is complete, it reads a subject's fighting performance as 'Bates', named after the college student's friend. The program can measure the Bates of any person, animal, machine or weapon, real or fictional. After settling his three year old debate, his friends help him make base stencils for the program so that it will be easier to use. These base stencils allow the user of the program to enter less information than needed before to determine the Bates of anything. And in 2060 when the program is deemed finally complete, the United States government catches wind of it.

It takes the U.S. government mere weeks to convince the college students to part with the program, and it takes only a few months more to tweak to program so that the U.S. can use it for war. With this program, the government is able to measure the Bates of any of their soldiers, any of their weapons, and any of their opponents'. In 2062, the United States agrees to release the program to the world. In 2063, the program is named by the internet: The Bate Program. And because of the global access to The Bate Program, the last war comes to an end in the year 2065.  Fighting still exists in the world, but to a smaller scale. The are also a few downsides to The Bate Program. Crime is now committed by people who have calculated the opposing Bates multiple times and know for a fact that they will get away with it, for example. On top of that, police forces everywhere use The Bate Program to determine how many Bates they'll need in any given situation, so if a situation arises that requires more Bates than the police can produce, they usually give in or call for back up. The most noticeable, day to day upside of The Bate Program is that any weapon with a Bate level of 5 or more is outlawed for ownership for any citizen without a permit in the year 2066. By 2068, The Bate Program becomes commonplace. In 2069, there are even cell phone apps for it. And surprisingly, the first reported incident of The Bate Program failing isn't until 2072. 

Due to The Bate Program, the game of Boxing changed drastically. Now that a human  
being's fighting potential could be determined at any given moment by punching in a few numbers, the Boxing Federation instituted a new rule. A boxer's Bate level would be kept secret until the start of a match, and would only be revealed to the announcers so that they could read off the levels after the match was over. At the end of a match, the Bate levels would be read for the crowd to hear. Not only would this keep the game of Boxing interesting, but it would also save the gambling side of the sport. Although you could keep track of the progressing Bate levels of any boxer, you couldn't keep track of their level during training or on holidays. No information was given, and the excitement of Boxing lived on. Then on June 12th 2072, a champion and a rookie face off. The resulting match destroys the image of The Bate Program, and makes the world halt for a moment. The first five minutes of the game, the two boxers seem to be even. Then, the champion lands a decent hit and knocks the rookie down, which comes as no surprise to the audience. But the rookie quickly gets up, which does come as a surprise. The champion, clearly also surprised, raises his fists for another go. This time, the rookie goes down after two minutes. After the rookie gets up a second time, the cheering from the crowd lowers to a dull roar. After three minutes of flying fists, the crowd is stunned as the rookie lands his first real blow on the champion. The champion staggers back, stunned. The rookie closes in, but the champion regains himself and knocks the rookie down for a third time. After the rookie gets up for the third time, the bell to ends the first round dings. Over the course of the next five rounds, it's clear that the champion has the upper hand, but the rookie refuses to stay down. And in the seventh round, the rookie lands a hit hard enough to knock the champion off of his feet. Angered, the champion lays into the rookie, not holding anything back any longer. In the eighth round, the judges announce that The Bate Program had predicted a clear round one knock out. But in the ninth round, the crowd fell silent as the rookie ducked and dodged a right hook to come back with a right hook of his own, landing his glove firmly on the champion's jaw, and knocking him down for the fourth and final time. Five seconds of silence is heard around the world, as everyone has been rendered speechless with shock. 

Not long after the world regained it's senses from The Bate Program failing to  
account for the human spirit in the boxing match that would become known as 'The Glitch Heard Round the World', many more incidents of The Bate Program failing begin to pop up everywhere; A hostage situation in New York that the police believe whole-heartedly the will win thanks to The Bate Program, but are taken aback as the criminal blows up the entire building along with himself inside; A small conflict between America and Mexico that ends with ten Americans being gunned down by a strategically placed platoon of Mexican soldiers; Even a local officer in Washington D.C. who is killed as he misfires a weapon he has had no previous knowledge of using, but The Bate Program said the weapon would be perfect for him. Eventually, the world is told that happenings such as these have been happening for a while, the world government has simply been hiding the truth. Not wanting to waste such a good thing, the government decided it would be better if the populous never found out that their almighty Bate Program was flawed, so that the government could use it to regulate many parts of life. And after this, outcries of the government finally pushing things too far spread like a wild fire. In 2076, a group of activists attacks Washington D.C. And although their efforts fail, the news inspired countless more rebellions around the world. 

And thus sparked World War III, also known as The Bate War.


End file.
